The Delusion and the Dreams in W. Jensen's Gradiva: Psychoanalytical interpretation of literature

Freud uses his neurosentheoretical beliefs as well as his insights into the principles of dream production described in "Interpretation of Dreams" to a novella that recounts a strange oscillation between dream, imagination, and delusion in the hero's psyche. Freud was captivated by the analogy between the historical fate of Pompeii, its burial and subsequent excavation, and the phenomena with which he was concerned, the burial of psychiatric contents via repression and their rediscovery during psychoanalytic work: psychoanalysis as soul archaeology. Biography: Sigmund Freud, born in Freiberg (Moravia) in 1856; studied at the Vienna Medical Faculty; 1885/86 study visit to Paris, under the influence of J.-M. Charcot turn to psychopathology; subsequently, in private practice in Vienna, preoccupation with hysteria and other forms of neurosis; foundation and further development of psychoanalysis as a separate method of treatment and research as well as a general psychology including the phenomena of normal soul life. Freud relocated to London in 1938, where he passed away in 1939.